Impact of Mike Hubbard trial could go beyond courtroom

In a schoolroom-sized chamber on the second floor of the Lee County Justice Center Tuesday, a trial will begin that could cut through Alabama politics like a coroner’s knife, with all the grisly revelations that follow.

Prosecutors with the Alabama Attorney General's Office say Hubbard used his public offices – first as Alabama Republican Party chairman, then as House Speaker – to secure consulting clients and business investments in violation of the Alabama Ethics Act. Hubbard, a Republican from Auburn, maintains his innocence and his attorneys say the transactions were proper.

The proceedings may pull in other notable political figures, including Gov. Robert Bentley; former Gov. Bob Riley and dozens of legislators, lobbyists and staffers, who all could testify in the case. Hundreds of emails Hubbard sent and received between 2011 and 2013, already included in the case file, will add to the debate by attorneys about the meaning of actions and transactions Hubbard had with dozens of politicians, lobbyists and business leaders inside and outside of Montgomery.

Beyond the courtroom, the outcome of the trial could have a significant effect on Alabama politics and the House of Representatives at a time when Bentley and Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore find themselves stuck in their own controversies and critical decisions on Medicaid loom.

The case

The charges against Hubbard fall into four broad categories:

Prosecutors accuse the speaker, chairman of the Alabama Republican Party from 2007 to 2011, of steering party advertising and printing business to the Auburn Network, his consulting firm, and Craftmasters, an Auburn-based printing firm in which Hubbard held a partial interest.

Hubbard is also accused of using his office to secure consulting contracts – one with the Southeast Alabama Gas District (SEAGD) worth $12,000 a month – and of soliciting lobbyists, including Riley, for jobs or investments.

The speaker is also accused of inserting language in a General Fund budget that would have benefited the American Pharmacy Cooperative Inc. (APCI), a consulting client, and later voting for that budget.

Hubbard also faces charges of lobbying Bentley and Alabama Secretary of Commerce Greg Canfield on behalf of clients.

Conviction on any one of the counts would leave Hubbard facing up to 20 years in prison and a $30,000 fine. It would also trigger his removal from office.

The attorneys in the speaker’s case are under a gag order until the conclusion of the trial, but potential arguments have emerged in the hundreds of filings made since a grand jury indicted Hubbard in Oct. 2014. In a February 2015 motion, prosecutors argued that Hubbard, who lost his job with sports marketing firm IMG shortly after becoming speaker, went to lobbyists to make up the difference.

“Hubbard was motivated by his financial problems, including the loss of his employment with IMG, to solicit lobbyists and principals for things of value (i.e. consulting contracts for Auburn Network, financial favors, etc.),” the filing stated. “Hubbard’s solicitation of persons with interests before the Alabama legislature was also directly related to his service as a public official.”

Hubbard has defended some of the transactions. The speaker argues Craftmasters allowed economies of scale that saved the party money and notes the Alabama Ethics Commission approved the $12,000 per month contract with SEAGD. Hubbard also says his APCI contract focused on out-of-state issues.

But the speaker’s defense team said relatively little about the charges over the last 18 months as they focused on an unsuccessful attempt to have the case dismissed over allegations of prosecutorial misconduct. In a filing last September, attorney Mark White, who represented Hubbard until January, addressed the counts in a broader filing seeking to dismiss the case on grounds that the Alabama Ethics Act – which Hubbard championed and voted for – was unconstitutionally vague and broad as applied to the speaker, and wrote that Hubbard had a First Amendment right to lobby for his clients.

“The Act, as applied, simply does not provide the citizens of Alabama fair warning as to what constitutes legal versus illegal conduct,” White wrote.

Walker denied the motion in February.

During jury selection last week, Hubbard attorney David McKnight suggested a possible defense strategy, telling potential jurors Hubbard was “an entrepreneur and a businessman and a salesman” who may have been “pushy” but did not break any laws.

John Carroll, a professor at Cumberland School of Law and a former federal judge, said Friday the prosecution would have to keep the jury “organized” as it presents the 23 charges, though he said the job would be easier due to the overlapping nature of most of the counts. The defense, he said, would have to convince the jury “the facts don’t amount to an ethics law violation.”

But making the case, he said, was more challenging than prosecuting violent crimes, where there are clear victims.

“There are a lot of problems presenting ethics cases,” he said. “You don’t know what the jury’s attitude is. Some jurors may take the attitude. ‘Yeah he’s guilty, but so is everyone else.’”

Hubbard is one of the most powerful figures in the state. He played a key role in the 2010 landslide that put the Legislature in Republican hands, and for the first four years as speaker ran the House with little opposition.

His grip has loosened in the last two years – in part due to the indictment, but also due to the growing experience of those first brought in with the landslide and, in one representative’s description, “the lack of predators” the Republican supermajority could unite against after getting most of their 2010 agenda passed.

Representatives agreed last week there was no clear heir to Hubbard. Should the jury convict Hubbard, a leadership struggle could develop as factions put their candidates forward for the job. That could further complicate efforts to address funding shortfalls in Medicaid, which could lead Bentley to call a special session this year.